"Butterfly" was the only reason I purchase this lens. But it became my most used long zoom after I get it (well, I don't have much good long zooms).
At that time, I want to get a handy lens for taking butterflies, but Sigma 180 macro was the only reasonable choice for me. The Sigma was not cheap, and it is Sigma. I hesitated for a long time. Until I chatted with a shop manager in a camera shop, he recommended this Tamron because it's cheap, and it can give reasonable result.
So I get it at a little over HK$1,000. It's cheap indeed.
The lens is very plastic, very cheap in construction. It doesn't not give a good displacement turn for focusing, so the Pentax may mis-focus it at long focal length, and it's a pain in the ass to focus manually. At it's price, the image quality is not bad, but don't expect razor sharp image from it.
I don't care all these disadvantages. The lens can focus to 0.95m at macro mode, and it's 1:2 at 300mm. It's the macro function I want from it, and it can deliver.
In use, I seldom zoom all the way-up to 300mm because it's quite soft there. But that's the common problem with cheap long zooms. I can still take butterflies or other inserts very comfortably at 180mm (the shortest focal length allowed at macro mode), or zoom up to a bit over 200mm. The result very not bad if you are do a correct job at Photoshop.
Because of it's versatility, I carry this lens together with my DA16-45/4 for traveling. Not that it's very good (I indeed think the DA 50-200 will be better), only because it's the better long zoom I have on hand.
It's not a Pentax lens, so don't expect it can give you the natural tones legendary for SMC lens. The colors from Tamron is a bit too saturated and high in contrast, but I don't have much complain.
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